


Fact Versus Fiction

by Talithax



Category: Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2011)
Genre: Angst, Established Relationship, Explicit Language, M/M, Mental Anguish, POV First Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-21
Updated: 2015-06-21
Packaged: 2018-04-05 10:29:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,930
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4176465
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Talithax/pseuds/Talithax
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Ethan goes missing for a second time, Will struggles to keep it together...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fact Versus Fiction

**Author's Note:**

> ~ Narrated by Will, self-beta'd.
> 
> ~ Could easily have the subtitle of 'If It's Not One Thing, It's Another'.
> 
> ~ To be honest, the goal here was to -- go against my instinct! -- attempt to mess with Ethan's head for a change. As, however, this is turn succeeded in messing with Will's head as well, I probably only managed to half reach my goal! Oh well... I tried.

===============  
Fact Versus Fiction  
by TalithaX  
===============

 

The agent's words, despite being both clearly enunciated and in English, not really making any great sense to me, I draw myself up to my full height, fold my arms across my chest, and glare at him through narrowed eyes. “Excuse me?” I grind out in a low growl that, even to my own ears, sounds nothing like my normal speaking voice. “What do you mean he's... disappeared?”

“I'm sorry, Will... Uh... Agent Brandt... He... He's just disappeared,” Agent Paul Field replies in a faltering tone as, unable to meet my accusing gaze, he takes a hesitant step backwards. “One minute he was... uh... there, and the next time anyone went to look in on him he was gone.”

“Gone,” I repeat with a slow shake of my head. “Just like that, huh? He just up and... vanished.”

“If it helps, our investigations so far have led us to believe that it was entirely of his own accord,” Field responds, holding his iPad out towards me and gesturing with his free hand at the grainy CCTV footage of the hospital ward were now standing in that fills the tablet's small screen. “We're... Uh... Quite convinced that nothing untoward happened to him, and that... uh... this is something he chose to do himself.”

“Quite convinced... Something he chose to do himself...” 

I just...

Dear God.

I can't do this. 

I can't do any of it.

Not any more.

I'm done. Spent. Out for the fucking count. Not just at the end of my tether but gnawing my way through it so I...

… Can just give in.

Let loose.

Lose my shit.

Give up my hold on the icy, clinical control I've fought so hard to keep ever since I first learned of Ethan's disappearance seven days ago and just...

… Lose it.

Big time.

Seven. Count them. My best friend and lover was captured seven days ago and, instead of being able to catch the first flight back to the States to assist in the search for him, I...

I did as I was ordered, as the mission dictated, and what – regardless of the fact he's never been known to toe the party line in his life – Ethan himself would have no doubt wanted, and I stayed put in London. I threw myself into completing the fucking mission which, by this stage, already meant nothing to me and I no longer cared about, while Ethan, he...

Actually, I still don't even know what Ethan's been through. I know that Field's team finally managed to locate and extract him some time last night, local time. I also know, although the intel has been sketchy at best, that his extensive injuries point to having been tortured, and that he was taken to this small, private, and favoured by IMF for its discretion, hospital on the outskirts of Los Angeles to be both checked out and patched up in.

And that, really, is all that I know.

Missing for seven days. Tortured.

Oh. And apparently he's now missing again.

“You know something, Field? No. It doesn't fucking help!” I all but yell as, shooting him a disgusted look, I start to pace backwards and forwards in front of him. “This... This is bullshit! Just... Tell me, Agent Field, how an injured man can go missing on your watch, huh? Are you blind? Were you slacking off? Or, I don't know, perhaps you're just fucking useless!” 

I know I'm not being fair on Field, who, for what it's worth, is both older and more physically imposing than I am and who, going on everything I've read about him, is actually quite a good agent, but I just can't help it. Having been burning the candle at both ends by running the mission in London while simultaneously trying to keep up with both the investigation into Ethan's disappearance and Benji and Jane's side of the mission in Paris, for too long, I'm exhausted, as much physically as I am mentally, and I just don't have it in me to play nice. I'd thought, obviously mistakenly, as it happens, that things were finally starting to go our way for a change. The news of Ethan's rescue coincided with – perfect timing – our mission in the UK and Europe coming to a successful end, and I'd been able to fly direct from London to LA to, or so I'd assumed anyway, be with him.

I thought it was over.

I thought, given that Benji and Jane are scheduled to land within the hour, that we'd be all back together again and that, whatever Ethan had been through, we'd be by his side to help him through it.

I...

I thought I'd be able to breathe again.

That...

Both the pressure in my head and the pain in my chest would finally let up and things, they'd start to get better.

I thought, and when it all boils down to it this is the absolute crux of the matter, I'd be with Ethan.

Ethan, who I haven't seen for ten days, and whose voice I haven't heart for eight. Ethan, who...

… I love more than I've ever loved anyone before him.

I...

I can't...

This just can't be happening. 

It was supposed to be over, not just starting afresh.

“I'll admit that losing an agent is a little... uh... peculiar,” Field replies in a neutral as, not allowing himself to – come down to my level – be riled up by my antagonistic attitude, he gazes at me impassively, “but you've got to remember here that the agent in question is Ethan Hunt. Now, you know...”

“You are not helping yourself here, Field,” I snap, coming a stop barely inches in front of him and, just for good measure, poking my finger forcefully in to his chest. “In fact, here's a news flash for you. Of course I fucking know that the agent in question is Ethan Hunt. What I also know, however, is that despite being under your not-so-very watchful eye, he's gone missing. Again! Now, I don't know, but perhaps that should strike you as being a little fucking peculiar all in itself!”

“What I was merely trying to get across, Agent Brandt, is that if Hunt wanted to get out of here for some reason, then...” Pausing, he looks me in the eye and shrugs. “Then not even you could have stopped him.”

“I...” Although I can't deny that there's truth in what Field just said about Ethan being the consummate escape artist, I'll be damned if I'm going to give him the satisfaction of hearing me say it and settle instead for giving his chest another rough poke with my finger. “I wouldn't tar me with the same level of incompetence that you appear to have been smeared with, if I were you, Agent Field,” I sneer. “An injured agent was under your watch, and now he's gone. Tell me. How's that going to look on your record, huh?”

“Clearly he left for a reason,” Field replies, ignoring my latest slur entirely as, with another shrug, he walks away from me and goes to look out through the window. “Just what that reason happens to be though is, well, anyone's guess. As you're already aware, the mission he'd been working on has been finalised, it's unlikely that he's gone off to seek revenge as Witter didn't survive the extraction, so... Seeing as you seem to think you know him so well, Agent Brandt, what does that leave?”

Too focused on trying to remember where I might have heard the name Witter before to come up with a reply, I remain silent and, for no real reason than I don't know what else to do, resume my pacing. Ethan, who's injured, although I'm yet to learn how badly, has taken it upon himself to escape the essentially safe confines of hospital. Someone called Witter, who I can't shake the feeling I should probably know, and who it appears was behind Ethan's abduction, is dead. I want, even though I know deep down that it's not his fault and that neither no-one nor nothing would have stood in Ethan's way once he'd decided he wanted out, to grab Field by the shoulders and shake him until his teeth rattle.

All of this, I know. Everything else though...

Where's Ethan? What's made him run?

“No answer, huh,” Field mutters, turning around and giving me, if I'm not mistake, a vaguely contemptuous look. “Oh well, it doesn't matter. We'll find him.”

“Actually... No. You won't.” I once again position myself directly in front of Field and coldly hold his gaze. “I'll find him.”

~*~*~*~

“Come on, Will, you need to take a break,” Jane announces, placing a plate containing a slice of pizza on the table next to my laptop. “Having struck out so spectacularly in my attempt to get you to take a nap earlier, I'm back to try my luck at getting you to eat something.” 

“I don't need a break and I'm not hungry,” I reply automatically as, the mere smell of the pizza being enough to churn my stomach, I shove it further along the table before turning my attention straight back to the screen. “Thank you, but...”

“You need to take break,” Jane repeats, cutting me off as she sinks down into the chair next to mine. “I know you don't want to, but...”

“I'm fine,” I interrupt, turning my head to shoot Jane a warning look in the hope that she'll translate it to mean she'd be wise to leave me alone. I'm over-tired, over-emotional, and, to be perfectly blunt, not – a nice person to be around – in the mood for company. “Seriously, Jane. I really am...”

“You're fine and I'm...” Shrugging, Jane rolls her eyes and shakes her head. “You know something? I'm too tired to go the sarcasm route and am going to settle instead for the far more simple... Bullshit. You're not fine, Will. I'm not fine and, while I'm at it, I'm fairly certain Benji is pretty far from fine as well, so... Don't. Don't bullshit me, and don't try to fob me off as I'm no more in the mood to play verbal games than you are.”

“I...” Sighing, I slump back in my chair and give Jane a sheepish look. “Sorry,” I murmur, stretching out my hand and lightly brushing the tips of my fingers against hers. “I know you're not fine, that, hell, just about everything is far from fine at the moment, but...” Lifting my hand, I gesture at the laptop screen. “I have to feel as though I'm doing something. I... I mean... How can I eat or sleep when...” Trailing off, I shake my head helplessly and, tilting my head back, gaze up at the ceiling. “I just... I have to feel as though I'm doing... something.”

“I get it, I do,” Jane replies gently, “but, come on, Will... Think about it. What's burning yourself out going to achieve, huh? It's not as though Benji's programs are going to stop working their magic without you sitting there staring at a screen. Nor is it as though we wouldn't wake you the very second we came up with something. So, please... Put yourself first for a mere hour or so and have a catnap. This... You can't go on like this and you know it.”

“I can,” I whisper, lowering my head to gaze not at Jane but at the laptop screen showing the facial recognition software that's taking its feed from real time cameras scattered across Los Angeles. “I can because... I have to. Jane... I know that as far as Benji's programs go it doesn't matter if I live or die and that I'm completely superfluous to what it is they're doing, but I have to do something. I... I just have to...” My breath catching in my throat, I shake my head and stare down at my hands. I know that I'm not taking things well and that my old friend Logic has taken a back seat to the anxiety and helplessness I'm feeling over Ethan's disappearance, but I just don't know what else to do. If I don't feel as though I'm doing something, or if I allow myself the undeserved luxury of rest, then...

Then what?

The noise in my head builds up to an unbearable level and I just crack?

“I have to do something,” I repeat faintly as, wanting her to see that I'm deadly serious, I glance at Jane and give her a grim smile. “I'm scared I'll go mad if I don't.”

“Will...”

“I...” Caught by the increasingly distraught looking expression on Jane's face, which, for what extremely little it's worth I suspect is mirrored on my own, I once again drop my gaze to the laptop and, feeling as though I perhaps have to do so, softly confess, “I love...”

“I know,” Jane interrupts matter-of-factly as she closes her hand around my shoulder and squeezes it. “You don't have to say it if you don't want to as I... That is, we know.”

“Oh...” Surprised, even though I'm not entirely sure why, by Jane's response, I don't quite know what to say. Although Ethan and I have never gone out of our way to hide our relationship from our team mates, at the same time nor have we ever really done anything to draw it to their attention. If anything – not, really, that it's one of those things I ever cared to waste that much time thinking about – I'd have thought they'd have just written us off as... friends with benefits. Yes, we sometimes slept in the same room when we didn't have to and, okay, maybe our preference for being seated together on flights might have seemed a little pointed, but...

Whatever.

It's not as though it matters, anyway.

“We're spies, remember,” Jane murmurs, pulling her chair closer to me as she gently rubs her hand along my upper arm. “We... observe things, and, while, hey, it's got absolutely nothing to do with us, we're happy for the pair of you as it's clear that you're good for each other. So... Seriously, Will, don't ever think you have to hide your relationship on our account as there's no need. No need at all.”

“There's not going to... be... a relationship if we don't find him,” I reply, choosing to gloss over Jane's – and seemingly Benji's as well – easy acceptance of our relationship, not because I'm embarrassed by it, because God alone knows I'm not, but because, simply, there's not really anything more than needs to be said about it. We're in a relationship. Our team mates know. And life, one way or another, goes on. “I... Damn it, Jane! I just feel so fucking helpless!” I exclaim, jerking my head up to gaze at her. “I was against the team being split up in the first place, I regret having oh-so-dutifully put the mission first by staying in London when I should have been here looking for Ethan, and now... Now I can't do anything to find him! He... He took himself out of hospital when what he really needs is to be recuperating because...” Unable to say it for fear of hearing it aloud making it seem more viable, or... possible, somehow, I fall silent and clench my fingers into the denim of my jeans.

“He thinks that you're dead and he wants to be alone to plan his next move,” Jane finishes as, shifting her chair even closer, she slings her arm around my shoulders and gives me a rough hug.

Too taken aback by her latest display of almost uncanny perceptiveness to know how to reply, I open my mouth in anticipation of coming out with something, say, even an... 'oh'... or a grunt, but nothing comes out.

In fact, unless you count a growing sense of awe in respect to just how on the ball Jane really is, I've got nothing.

“It's okay, Will,” she murmurs. “You can quit the shocked, or should that perhaps be... oddly mortified act because I know the thought would have crossed your mind too. Ethan's chosen to disappear because, for one, he's not exactly a star patient at the best of times and hates having people, or, worse, psychiatrists, fussing over him, and secondly, he thinks Witter killed you. So, of course, especially seeing as he doesn't know all the facts and was unconscious when Field lodged a bullet in Witter's head, he'd be consumed with thoughts of wanting to both get to the bottom of what was going on and get his revenge.”

Gently shifting out from under Jane's arm, I turn to face her and slowly rub my hand over my forehead. “You're right,” I reply, “they're the sort of thoughts I've had too. I... I just didn't want to mention them though for, I don't know, fear of perhaps coming across as though I... uh... had ideas above my station or, you know, was attributing far too much weight to how Ethan might feel about me.”

“That confession I stopped you from making a few minutes ago?” Jane mutters with an all too brief yet, at the same time, warm smile. “Don't for a second think it's unrequited. Ethan, he lo...”

“Don't... Please,” I interrupt, making not even the slightest attempt to disguise the fact I'm basically pleading with Jane not to give voice to it. I know, not that he's ever said so in as many words, that Ethan loves me, and I don't care that Jane seems to be as aware of this as I am, but I just don't want to hear it. I don't want to hear it from Jane when I'm so terrified that perhaps I've missed my chance to hear it from Ethan. “I... I don't want to hear it. Not... Not like this.”

“Well, he does,” she retorts, quickly ruffling her fingers through my hair before sitting back and fixing me with a 'and don't you dare argue with me' look. “Ethan's found you nothing other than fascinating from the very moment he dragged your water-logged ass out of that river in Moscow and, while I'm not going to harp on it because I know this conversation is making you edgy, there's not a damn thing he wouldn't do for you.”

“For any of us,” I correct. “He'd... go above and beyond for all of us. Just as... uh... we would for him.”

“Of course we would. That goes without saying. I'm just not convinced that... he'd go AWOL from hospital in his rage and grief for...”

“Don't... Jane... Please, just don't. Thinking that it could even be the case is bad enough without... breaking it down or going over it. I... We don't know why he's chosen to...”

“Maybe we don't, but can you honestly think of a more likely reason? Don't forget he doesn't know everything that we now know, and that what he saw would have seemed incredibly real to him. I mean, having seen that fucking awful footage for myself, if I didn't have you sitting here next to me right now there's more than a good chance I'd be believing it myself. Witter... I'll say one thing for that mother fucker, he sure knew how to put on a good show.”

“Don't... I...” I know I'm both only repeating myself and avoiding the issue at hand, but... Talking about it isn't going to achieve anything. It's not going to help find Ethan and, as with so many things at the moment, I just can't do it. I can't sit here discussing everything Witter put him through and how, possibly because he had delusions of being able to sit down and relive his perceived brilliance at a later date, the bastard thought it would be a good idea to film his sick and twisted, as Jane just called it, 'show'.

I've watched it.

I shouldn't have, especially as I knew it wouldn't be able to add anything to the far more pressing matter of being able to find Ethan, but I did.

I watched it. Every second of it.

And then, because I was too numb to talk myself out of it, I watched it again.

I watched Samuel Witter, an ex-IMF agent I'd once worked a mission with and who, twelve months ago, Ethan had effectively had fired when he'd discovered Witter's brother-in-law had connections with the Chicago branch of the Russian Mafia, beat and torture Ethan on and off for days before...

… Killing me.

Or, as it happens, some poor bastard wearing a professionally made mask of my face and who, most likely, was chosen solely because he just happened to be the same height, weight, and build as I am.

Witter, who I think it's only fair to say was holding one hell of a grudge against the role Ethan played in him losing his job, killed the man he'd skilfully made up to look like me by first taking his time to beat him to a pulp before delivering the final coupe de grâce by dragging a hunting knife across his throat and leaving him to bleed out over Ethan's bare feet.

It...

Keeping in mind here that I'd already sat through hours of watching Ethan be subjected to all sorts of beatings and torture and should have been inured to all the hideous, gratuitous violence being played out on the computer screen, watching Witter, a man I'd once known and who, at the time, I hadn't found particularly offensive in anyway, kill someone... wearing my face, it...

Actually, describing how it made me feel isn't even something I can put into words. Stating the obvious here, of course I knew that the pointless death I'd just witnessed was that of a stranger, but Ethan didn't. Ethan, who was all bloody and bruised and barely conscious, believed that Witter had killed me in response to his refusal to give him the information he'd been demanding, and...

That...

Ethan's distraught expression and the way he reacted, straining against the ropes that held him tight to the chair and ranting at Witter about how he was going to kill him, that...

… Was the worst part of all.

Ethan, who looked near death himself, clearly – fell hook, line and sinker for Witter's carefully prepared and executed act – thought that I was dead and his grief was palpable. 

Just as, needless to say, my hatred of Witter was. Someone I'd once called an acquaintance had not only – gone to the Dark Side – joined forces with his brother-in-law in working with the Bratva, but he'd also gone above and fucking beyond with his treatment of Ethan and I hated...

Hate.

It doesn't matter that he's already dead as I still hate him. In fact, regardless of it being illogical, if not perhaps just that little bit crazy, if I could bring him back to life again just for the sole reason of being able to kill himself, I would.

I suspect I'd even enjoy it. I'd probably even do it slowly, just so I could savour the fucker's suffering.

Bastard.

I get feeling an urge to seek revenge against Ethan for causing him to lose your job. I can even see the pragmatic sense of joining the organisation he'd been – possibly erroneously, or, taking recent events into consideration, possibly not – linked to. What I can not comprehend, and if this makes me more naive than I should be given both the world I live in and the career I've chosen then so be it, are the lengths Witter went to in order to achieve his goal. I've seen, been a part of, and endured a lot in my time, and it's certainly not as though I've never found myself despairing of human nature before, but this...

This really was something else.

And not just because I found it so personal, either.

It was cruel, over-the-top, and for no other reason than I know I'll never be able to deliver my own form of retribution on Witter, I'm actually sorry that his death was so quick and easy. At least if he was still alive I'd be able to have the sense of satisfaction of knowing he was rotting in a maximum security prison somewhere.

But...

… No.

Witter's dead.

Ethan is injured and, most likely because he believes I'm dead, licking his wounds somewhere private while no doubt plotting ways to unleash hell on those he holds responsible.

And I'm...

… Here.

Stuck, with both Jane and Benji who feel as helpless and frustrated as I do, in a luxurious hotel suite and just sitting on my ass staring at a screen all day long. Ethan's been missing for close to three days now, and while it's true we know a lot more than what we did when we filtered in to LA and were hit with the news of his disappearance, what we... don't... know weighs heavily on us.

Where is he?

Given that he should be recuperating in hospital, is he okay?

Ethan being nothing if not the very best at what he does, do we even stand any chance of actually being able to find him when it's so obvious that he doesn't want to be found?

What if he misjudged both his injuries and ability to fend for himself, and...

It...

… Doesn't bear thinking about.

Let's face it, reality is more than bad enough already without falling prey to the million and one 'what if' scenarios that could so easily take over.

Witter was working for the Bratva. The Bratva had an interest in taking over the operations of the Estaban cartel. The Estaban cartel, despite originating from, and having most of their ties to, South America, had recently branched out to include the UK and Europe in their people smuggling operation. Because of this, I was following leads in London while Jane and Benji posed as brokers in Paris, and Ethan, although he'd started as a possible customer in Mexico City, had ended up following one of the cartel's most senior members to Los Angeles. Which...

Was where he had the misfortune of encountering Witter.

We know this thanks to the work of Field – who I probably should apologise to at some point for behaving the way that I did in the hospital – and his team. It's also courtesy of Field going back to the abandoned warehouse Witter had been using to hold Ethan in and going over both it and all his computer equipment with a fine tooth comb that we have what will forever be in my mind the worst piece of video footage ever recorded.

We know the whys and the hows, and we, unlike Ethan, know that the Estaban mission came to a wholly successful conclusion.

We just don't know where Ethan is, that's all.

And...

… It's eating me alive.

I wasn't able to be involved in his rescue, and I can't do anything for him now.

Nothing.

Not a damn thing.

“Hey... Will... Snap out of it. Your silent routine is scaring me,” Jane murmurs as she stands up and positions herself behind my chair. “Everything will be okay,” she continues, draping her arms over my shoulders and gently resting her chin on the top of my head. “You'll see. We'll find Ethan, and this time next week we'll all be back together as a team again.”

“I wish I had your...”

“You know, I think we've been going about this all wrong,” Benji announces, talking all over the top of me as, carrying an open laptop, he walks out of his bedroom and shoots us both a slightly befuddled look. “In fact, I'm sure of it. We've been concentrating on real time feeds, yeah. You know, of all the obvious subjects like airport terminals, train stations, and traffic cameras.”

“We know that, Benji,” Jane replies. “It's what we do. I mean, I know Ethan's good, but even he's got to pop up at some point.”

“Not if he's holed himself up somewhere while he heals, he doesn't,” Benji responds almost smugly as he places his laptop on the table and spins it around so that we can see the screen. “Think about it. Ethan, still no doubt feeling like death warmed up, left the hospital for reasons still known only to himself, although, yeah, we've already got our suspicions, and... What would he have done, huh? I honestly don't think he would have been up to travelling very far, so...”

“So your idea is to change our search pattern to... the first twelve or so hours of his disappearance and just concentrate on footage captured in that time frame,” I finish, placing my left hand over Jane's and giving it a quick squeeze as, for the first time since setting up base in the hotel, I can feel a welcome sense of enthusiasm settle over me.

Something different.

A fresh direction.

“Benji, you're a genius!”

~*~*~*~

The run down, barely fit for rodent, let alone human inhabitation, three-storey... hovel... I'm staring across the street at, looks, and I see absolutely no reason to mince words here whatsoever, about as appealing as receiving a prostrate exam from someone with hands as big as the Hulk's. Graffiti, more of the uninspiring and repetitive 'tag' variety than pieces possessing any form of artistic merit, cover both of the side walls I can see from the pavement to the roof, at least half of the windows are boarded over with pieces of wood... re-purposed... from old pallets, and unless my eyes are playing tricks on me I honestly believe it's even leaning slightly to the left. To call it in need of being condemned is an understatement of massive proportions, and, going on the chemically smell pervading the air surrounding it, if some of the rooms aren't being used as meth labs then, as the old saying goes, I'm a monkey's uncle. 

Yet, and if this isn't a damning indictment of my evening so far then I don't know what is, it's not even the worst building I've seen in the neighbourhood. In fact, given that someone's actually gone to the effort to board the broken windows over instead of just leaving them all cracked and smashed in, and it still has, albeit an incredibly dirty one, a front door, it almost looks... homely... compared to some of the slums I've both walked past and, in some instances, gone in to. It pains me to admit it, but it even smells better, too. Perhaps I've got my priorities wrong but, I don't know, I still think I'd rather take my chances with the possibly noxious odours given off by volatile chemicals than I would the constant aroma of human excrement any day.

How people choose to live their lives has nothing to do with me. For all I know the people in this particular ghetto of LA are perfectly content with their miserable excuse for an existence. I can just think of approximately five thousand other places – and, yes, I even include wearing Benji's stupid chainmail suit and having to put my faith in magnets in Mumbai here – I'd rather be, that's all. It's closing in on midnight, the night air is still oppressively hot, half of the street lights are out which is just adding to the 'dear God, I hope I get out of this hole alive' ambience of the place, and if I don't find Ethan soon I think I may well just snap once and for all and start braying at the moon.

Which, for what it's worth, is neither full nor all that visible behind the cloud cover and pollution.

Benji's brainwave of altering our search patterns finally coming up with a confirmed sighting of Ethan some three or so hours after he'd first announced we'd been going about it all wrong, the three of us have been pounding the pavement of this less than salubrious neighbourhood for over four hours now and the fact we haven't been able to locate him yet is starting to get me down. The grainy, yet unmistakeably recognisable image of a Ethan getting off a bus just around the corner from where I'm standing now being the first lead in all our days of – praying – looking, we'd seized on it eagerly and were on our way down to the car while Benji was still working on a getting the name of the suburb. The CCTV camera, one of a rare few in the neighbourhood that hasn't been taken out by any one of the gangs patrolling the area, having caught Ethan only a few hours after he'd been last seen at the hospital, we're hoping that, as Benji mentioned, he's found himself somewhere to hole up in and that, so long as we're careful, we'll be able to find him here. Too injured to have been able to be constantly on the move, it makes sense that he'd want to find somewhere... where the locals are both used to turning a blind eye and have seen everything before... to just disappear into. Poor, rough, and, basically, just don't give a fuck. So long as Ethan kept to himself or had the money to ensure that his limited needs were met, then I can see him having been able to fit right in.

Four hours, though.

The three of us, individually so we could cover more ground, have been knocking on doors and doing our best to both smile blindly and present a non threatening vibe for four fucking hours now and...

Nothing.

I've been ignored, spat at, abused for no other reason than they'd dragged their oversized ass to the front door only to discover I wasn't either the pizza delivery guy or their dealer, stared at blankly, and grunted at for four hours and have, fraying temper aside, nothing to show for it.

If Ethan's here, and, just call me psychic, I think he is, he's doing one hell of a job of staying invisible and, with only a few buildings left on the street before I've covered all of my allocated patch, I just don't know what we're going to do next if we don't find him here. Call in reinforcements and actually force our way into every structure within a mile radius of the bus stop? Go back to the drawing board?

I...

I just don't know.

My earlier sense of hope already feeling like little more than a distant memory, I just don't know how long I'll be able to keep this up for.

No.

That's not true.

Of course I know how long I'll be able to keep going like this for.

And that's until we find him.

Again. Whatever it takes. If we have to find ourselves still knocking on doors as the sun's coming up then...

… So be it.

Focussing on the hand written 'ROOM 4 LET. CASH ONLY. NO ID, NO PROBLEM' sign hanging from the only ground floor window that still has glass in it, I straighten my shoulders and, after having a quick look around for traffic, stride across the street. Knocking on the door, which already looks as though its been kicked in countless times before, striking me as being redundant in the extreme, I push it open with my shoulder and, with neither care nor thought as to just what it is I may be walking into, step inside.

The room, or I suppose you could possibly call it the building's sad excuse for a foyer, being as drab and unappealing as its façade, I only just resist the urge to start breathing through my mouth in an attempt to save my olfactory senses from the foul odour emanating from the room's residents and calmly – or, to them, arrogantly – size them up. While I accept that I'm pandering to stereotypes here, the six men staring back at me with dull amazement as they sit around a rickety looking coffee-table weighing up ounce bags of pot would have to the very embodiment of dumb as fuck gang bangers. I mean, come on! Advertise a room for let, even if the sign is code for 'get your pot here' for those in the know, and you're bound to get the odd person strolling in who genuinely just wants a room and who may take offence, or even worse, call the cops on you for thinking nothing of running your drug operation out of your front room.

Seriously. I don't get it. They might think they own the streets around here. Hell, for all I know this pack of losers really are this neighbourhood's equivalent of a 'Big Bad', but to be this open and blasé about their activities? It just smacks of stupidity.

Although it's hard to say given the dim lighting and the fact they're all wearing variations of the same uniform of dirty, low hanging – because, you know, the public both need to know and... care... about what brand of underwear they're wearing – jeans, over-sized white T-shirts and with a black bandanna tied somewhere around their upper body, I put the ages of the six men between their late teens to early thirties, and while I accept that this may be the entirely wrong attitude to have, I find them to be more a cause for amusement than I do fear. Yes, I'm out numbered, and, yes, it's clear – because once again they obviously feel no urge to hide anything from anyone who may make the mistake of stepping over their threshold – that there's enough firearms, what with the hand guns they've all got within easy reach and the couple of assault rifles I can see casually stacked against the arm of the sofa, in the room to take on a small invading force, but...

… I don't care.

I just don't care one fucking iota about these men and they either play the game my way or things are going to get very messy, very quickly.

“You lost or something, Fed,” one of the men drawls as, wanting to waste his energy on trying to intimidate me with his bulk, he drags himself off the sofa and, after trailing his fingers along the assault rifles, lumbers over to position himself only a metre or two away from me. Big and dumb – the lights may be on, but I don't think anyone's home – looking and with a truly revolting collection of skulls tattooed on his neck, the man folds his arms across his beefy chest and looks at me with obvious contempt. He's no more afraid of me than I am of him and his misguided confidence almost makes me want to laugh.

“I'm not a Fed,” I retort, barely bothering to look at him as I wake my phone up and make to hold it out towards him so that he can see the photo of Ethan I have up on the screen. “And nor am I interested in whatever the hell it is you're in to, so... Answer my question for me and I'll...”

“Not a Fed, huh?” the man grunts. “You sure... look... like a Fed. A Fed who's out past his bedtime.”

Out past my bedtime? What the fuck? If that's best he can do perhaps I should just knock him out now and try my luck with the other five. “I'm not a Fed,” I repeat, holding my phone up in the hope of actually getting the dumb bastard to look at it. “Now, I'm looking for...”

“DEA?” he interrupts, scowling at me in a way that I honestly think is meant to have me either quaking in my boots or scurrying out of the door in fear for my life. “ATF? Whatever you are, we ain't talkin'...”

“IMF,” I grind out with a cold smile. “As you seem so damn interested in my credentials, I'm IMF and, should you require validation... Oh! Sorry. My apologies for having used such a big word. If you want... proof... I'll be only too happy to shove my ID in your face once you've regained consciousness.”

My – far from idle – threat not going down all that well with the man's posse, they all sit up a little straighter and make to reach for the closest weapon. Beating them to it, I have my gun out of its hiding spot nestled in the waistband of my cargo pants and trained on their leader before they're even fully aware that I've moved and, it finally getting too much for me, start to laugh. “What? Don't tell me you haven't heard of IMF?” I sneer, flicking the safety off and aiming the gun directly at his forehead. “I'm hurt. Really, I am.”

“I've heard of IMF,” the man mutters as he slowly unfolds his arms and gestures for his men to stand down. “Heard enough about 'em at any rate to know we don't want no trouble with 'em.”

“Hmm... Maybe you're not so dumb after all,” I reply, watching the men settle back down in their seats before returning my gun to the small of my back and all but shoving the phone in the man's face. “This man. I want to know if you've seen him around.”

Nodding, the man glances towards the darkened stairs at the back of the room. “Second floor. Room seven,” he states dismissively, his interest in attempting to use me as a play thing clearly having died at hearing just who it is I work for. Digging into his pocket, he retrieves a small bunch of keys and, with a shrug, throws them at me. “Sick of replacing the damn doors,” he adds by way of explanation as, with another shrug, he walks back over to the sofa and flops down on it. “You can let yourself out.”

“Actually, as two of my friends will be joining me in a moment, we'll... let ourselves out,” I reply, hiding my excitement at the man's confirmation of Ethan only being a couple of floors above my head by continuing to stare at the man. “Be sure to extend the same hospitality you showed me to them.”

“Yeah. I'll just go get the red carpet to roll out,” he retorts, gesturing towards the stairs again. “Just... Go and do what you have to do. As I just want you all gone, I give you my word that your friends are safe.”

“And for that I truly thank you,” I murmur, giving the men a mock bow before hitting the button for Jane's number on my phone and, as it rings, starting to head towards the stairs. Jane picking up on the second ring, I quickly tell her the good news before giving her the address and telling her to pick Benji up and for the pair of them to meet me here as soon as possible. This done, I don't waste my time on sharing her obvious happiness at finally having found Ethan and, without another word, end the call and return the phone to my pocket. Taking them two a time, I bound up the stairs and, as I step onto the second floor landing which, if anything, is even more run down and abandoned looking than the front room is, focus more on my relief at being only seconds away from Ethan than just what it is he must be going through in order for him to have found himself here. Sure, it's anonymous, and there's no denying – especially seeing its taken us three days to find him – it makes for a more than adequate bolt-hole, but these points aside it's an absolute hovel and the thought of him convalescing here, it..

It doesn't matter.

As it's soon to be over, nothing matters other than I'm about to be reunited with Ethan. 

Ignoring the – beaten in to me by history – small niggle of doubt in the back of my head that perhaps the man was only pulling my leg in order for him and his gang to disappear while I went upstairs, I reach a door with the number seven written on it in what I suspect is spray paint and, as the tempo of my heart speeds up in anticipation, loudly knock on the peeling wood.

“Hey, Ethan! If you're in there, let me in. It's me, Will,” I call out as, not exactly feeling patient at the moment, I try the door handle. Finding it locked, I knock again and, telling myself that he could well be asleep, have another go at rousing him with the sound of my voice. “Come on, Ethan! Let me in! You have no idea how badly I need to know if you're okay!” When this too heralds no sounds of movements coming from inside the room, I sigh in exasperation and, locating the one with a seven etched in to it, use the key given to me by the gang leader to unlock the door and step into the darkened room. “Ethan? While I'm usually all for giving you your privacy...”

The rest of my statement dying on my lips as what feels to be a wooden chair is brought down heavily over my head and shoulders, I fall to my knees and, without even thinking about it, quickly stretch out my leg and sweep it across my assailant's shins. Felling him, I shake off my shock at having been attacked and, operating purely on instinct here, jump to my feet. Retrieving my gun with one hand while I use the other to flick on the light switch, I gaze down at my would be attacker as he lies sprawled on the filthy, stained carpet, and...

… Hardly believe my eyes.

Ethan.

Ethan, whose badly bruised face hardly looks like the man I love and who would have heard me identify myself from outside the door, tried to knock me out with a chair, and I...

It's like some sort of cruel joke.

I've finally found him, and...

… He's looking up at me through wide, frightened eyes, and with a look of absolute horror on his pale face.

“You... You're dead,” Ethan whispers hollowly as, clearly wanting to get away from me, he shuffles backwards. “He killed you. I... I saw it. You... You're not real!” His agitation levels increasing by the second, Ethan scrambles to his feet and, far more quickly than I would have given him credit for going on the decrepit looking state of him, tries to make a run for the door.

Startled by his sudden bid to escape, I grab him by the shoulders just before he makes it past me and pull him back into the room. “Ethan! Look at me. It's me, Will. I'm not...”

“You're dead,” he groans, his expression crumbling to one that can only be described as grief stricken. “I saw it. You're dead and... And I don't know why you're doing this to me!” A second wind coming over him, Ethan tries to squirm free of my hold. “Let me go! Please! I don't know what you want, but whatever it is I can't give it to you! I... I just want to be left alone...”

Having seen enough panic attacks in my time to know when I'm unfortunately witnessing one, I take a deep breath and, without pausing for either second thoughts or to consider just what it is I'm actually about to do, I spin Ethan around and, as he struggles wildly against me, press my forearm against his throat. “I'm sorry,” I whisper, wrapping my other arm around his waist and holding him against me as I gently apply the choke hold. God knows I don't want to be having to do it, but I just can't think of any other way of getting Ethan to calm down enough to get him out of here.

Once he's unconscious, I drop to my knees and slowly lower him down on to the floor. I then, once I've confirmed that his pulse is still steady, hug him to me and, as both the enormity of the situation hits me and Jane and Benji rush in to the room, only just control the urge to start sobbing.

Just...

Now what?

~*~*~*~

On paper at least, I should be able to sleep. I'm physically exhausted, the chair I'm in is comfortable, Ethan's safe and sound asleep in the bed in front of me, and...

… I'm so wired that I can barely think straight.

Although both Jane and Benji have told me not to dwell on it, that Ethan will be back to himself in no time, I keep thinking about, and keep going over and over what happened in that dirty, depressing little room. Thinking I was an hallucination or someone who just wanted to mess with his head, Ethan panicked at the sight of me and, solely for his own good, I...

I had to render him unconscious. 

I had to put my lover, the very man I've been going out of my mind with worry about for ten days now, in a choke hold in order to gain control of the situation.

I...

I had to.

I had no other choice. 

Not for my own sake, because I suspect slamming the chair down on me was the only move Ethan had in him, but for Ethan's. I had to get him out of there and, seeing as he wasn't giving any indication of wanting to come willingly, I had to improvise.

I had to do what I'm trained to do, and that's take charge. I had to size up what was taking place around me and I had to neutralise it. Waiting for the others wasn't an option because, my presence clearly doing a number on him, Ethan may have tried to bolt. And, given that he probably knew both the building and the neighbourhood better than I did, he may even have succeeded in pulling another disappearing act.

I had to do it.

I had to press my arm against Ethan's throat until he lost consciousness.

I did what I had to, but... it's just not something I ever want to find myself in the position of having to do again, though.

Not to Ethan.

The doctor, the same one who originally tendered to his injuries at the hospital, says that his time holed up in the slum hasn't done him any particular harm. As he'd had the forethought to take his collection of medications with him and had, according to the doctor who counted out the remaining pills in all of the packets, been dutifully taking them as directed, was probably even in almost as good a place recovery wise as he'd have been in if he hadn't left the hospital. Bruises, cracked ribs, abrasions and dislocations all heal in their own time anyway, he most likely hadn't left the room in all the time he'd been there and seemed to be well rested, and, as far as the doctor was concerned, things were going about as good as could have been expected. I tried to ask about his mental state, but as he'd been barely conscious while being looked over and settled in the far more comfortable looking bed in our hotel suite, the doctor hadn't really been able to give any form of a definite answer.

Trauma... Stress... Still healing... Given everything he went through...Blah, blah, blah... Will probably take a bit of time to feel settled...

In other words he wasn't able to give me anything that I didn't already know.

Ethan, though... I know what I saw when I looked in his eyes back in that room and it was terror. He was terrified of me. He was convinced that I was dead and, having me there in front of him, was simply terrifying.

And I don't know what to do about it, what to do for... him. There's nothing, not a damn thing, that I wouldn't give or do for Ethan, and the thought of not being able to do... anything... for him because he can't bear the sight of my face, it...

Well, the sense of breath restricting pain it installs in me is simply indescribable. 

Benji says that he'll be fine. That once he wakes up in a nice room surrounded by his friends, he'll quickly get with the program about all if it being real and will be his normal self in no time.

Jane, who's far more pragmatic and, dare I say it, sensible than Benji, is also of the opinion that he'll be fine. Possibly not upon waking for the first time, and that it may even take a couple of days, but, being nothing if not stubborn, he'll come around when he's good and ready.

I want to believe them. Of course I do. I don't even care which of their scenarios is the proven winner either as I'll just take whatever I can get. It's not that I want to appear greedy, or as though I'm never satisfied, but despite the fact I've now got Ethan back with me, it... doesn't really feel as though I've got him at all. The room lit by the soft glow of light coming from the lamp on the bedside table, I can see him, and I know that if I were to get up and walk over to the bed that I could touch him, but I...

I know that my touch wouldn't be welcome. That instead of Ethan being able to draw comfort from the gentle weight of my hand on his arm, there's every chance that it would just freak him out.

Having watched it in all of its graphic glory, I know that what he went through was hard. I also know that, at the end of the day, I just need to be patient and that, in time, things will have to get better.

It's just that I want them to be... better... now, that's all. Finding Ethan was meant to be the end of it, not just yet another new beginning.

If he...

If the damage done to his brain is irreversible...

Again, I just don't know what I'm going to do. 

Fight? Sure, I can fight. Just not if it's only going to prove to be Ethan's detriment. In order to fully heal he needs to be able to relax, and if he can't do that while I'm around, then...

“You're dead...”

Too focussed on my thoughts to have been paying Ethan any real attention, I jerk my head around to face the bed and find him both sitting up and staring at me with the exact same expression of disbelief and horror that was on his face back in the slum. “Ethan! Look at me. I really am...

“You're dead,” he repeats, louder this time as he pushes his back up against the wall and shakes his head repeatedly. “You... You're dead, and I... I don't know why you're doing this to me!”

~*~*~*~

“Okay, this is it,” Jane announces somewhat authoritatively as, all the time holding Ethan's lunch tray with her left hand, she carefully pulls the bedroom door shut behind her and fixes me with one of her patented no-nonsense looks. “Given that he both ate all his lunch for the first time and is already starting to mutter about looking forward to being let off for good behaviour and going for a run, I'd say your window of opportunity is very much wide open.”

“My... window of opportunity?” I query, keeping my gaze fixed on the gratifyingly empty plates on the tray as opposed to looking Jane in the eye. “I.. I don't know what you're talking about.”

“While that doesn't actually come as any great surprise to me, it doesn't for a second mean that you're not just going to dutifully do it anyway,” Jane replies as, gently tapping her foot against mine as she passes the armchair I'm sitting slumped and all but comatose in, she walks over to the room-service trolley and places the tray down on to it. “I'm telling you, Will, now really is as good a time as any to do what you know you have to do.”

“But that's just it, I... don't... know.” Sighing, I rest my head against the back of the chair and close my eyes. “Jane...”

“You're going to go in there and you're going to do whatever it takes to get it through to him that he's not hallucinating or seeing ghosts, and that you really are still very much alive,” Jane declares in a soft, matter-of-fact tone as, by the sound of her footsteps, she walks back over to the armchair. “Come on, Will. You know as well as I do that this can't go on, that... That it's not good for either of you.” 

“He doesn't want to see me,” I whisper, keeping my eyes screwed tightly shut even as Jane crouches down in front me and places her hands lightly on my knees. “I... Seeing me only upsets him and...”

“It upsets you, too,” Jane interrupts with a sigh. “Don't get me wrong, as I get it, I do. I get the whole sick and sorry mess, but we all know it can't just continue on like this. Ethan's getting better physically, while you...”

“It's not about me.” Tilting my head even further back, I open my eyes and stare up at the ceiling. “I'm... I'm fine.”

“You're fine and I'm going to give in to Benji's plaintive requests to dress up as Slave Girl Leia and join him at Comic-Con,” Jane shoots back as she tightens her hands around my knees. “Just... Listen to me, Will. You're not fine. You're not fine at all. You've been unravelling ever since Ethan went missing and you, unlike him, aren't getting any better. In fact, and I hate to say this because seeing you both like this is doing a number on me as well, I honestly think you're getting worse.”

“It... It's not about me,” I repeat in a dull, hollow voice. “It's about giving Ethan time to heal and... As seeing me clearly isn't conducive to his healing process, I...”

“What you need to do is go in there and, for both your sakes, get it through to him that his mind isn't playing tricks on him and you really are still alive,” she interjects with another sigh as, clearly in no mood to either play tricks or give up, she stands up and very gently strokes the back of her hand along the side of my face. “Will... At the risk of sounding like a plot line to one of those dodgy horror movies Benji likes so much, it's almost as though Ethan's growing stronger while you're fading and I can't, I... won't... stand by and just let it happen. You can say it's none of my business, or that it hasn't got anything to do with me all you like, but... It is, and it does. The two of you, and Benji too, of course, mean as much to me as my actual brothers do and I'm not going to let this... glitch... ruin the team, the... family... we've been able to make for ourselves. Both it, and all of you, are just too important to me for that.”

Something in Jane's clearly heartfelt statement getting in some small way through to me, I lower my head and reluctantly meet her concerned gaze. “I don't want to lose it either,” I confess softly. “The three of you are my family and I want things to go back to being the way they were as much, if not more than anyone, but Ethan, he...” Trailing off, I lean forward and, as my breath catches in my throat, slowly shake my head. “Jane... The way he looks at me, it... It doesn't matter how much logic I throw at it as it just... It...”

“It's eating you alive,” she finishes quietly. “And that's just it, Will, it... is... eating you alive. You hate seeing Ethan like this, and you don't know what to do about it, and it has to stop. Just... Think about it. You're not coping because you're worried sick about adding to Ethan's distress, while... he's distressed and only healing physically as opposed to mentally as well because he's still convinced that what he saw is real. You think you're doing the right thing by him by keeping your distance, but you're not. Again, I get it, I really do but, come on, you know as well as I do that something is just going to have to give.”

“I...” She's right. Of course she is. Things can't go on like they have been and I know, given Ethan's fragile state, that it has to be up to me to make the first move. I know it, and it's not as though I haven't wasted quite a few hours getting absolutely nowhere thinking about it, but... Knowing it and actually feeling up to doing anything about it are two entirely different things. I can think about it, and I can even go so far as to both realise and accept the logic of trying to do something about it, but that, really, is as far as it goes.

I want to see Ethan, to be with him in any way that I can, as much as I...

… Don't want to.

And the reason for not wanting to is simple.

And that's that I'm afraid.

I'm afraid of upsetting him, of standing there feeling like a complete and utter waste of space while he disintegrates even further in front of me, of...

… Not being able to do a single fucking thing to successfully get it through to him that he's wrong, that I really am both alive and here for him.

I'm afraid of...

Well. Right now it feels as though I'm afraid of everything. Of that look of fear tinged disbelief in Ethan's eyes whenever he sees me. Of perhaps losing him forever. Of never being able to find either the right words to say or the right thing to do. Of there being no end in sight, no end to these feelings of numbness and as though I'm trapped, unmoving and incapable, in stasis. Of blindly pushing forward only to do Ethan far more harm than good. 

So...

I do nothing.

I sit around, taking up space and listening politely to Jane and Benji as they talk to me, and I worry myself sick about Ethan, and that's it. Sleep, as well as having any sort of an appetite, elude me, I haven't left the hotel suite since I walked in through its doors four days ago, and, the image of Ethan's shocked reaction to finding me in his room being one that just keeps running in a constant loop in my head, I haven't even been able to bring myself to see him since I fled from his room three nights ago. He's only a few metres away from me, just on the other side of a closed door, but I just can't do it. I can't run the risk of inadvertently setting his recovery back, or...

… Of finding myself under that startled, fearful gaze again.

I...

I'm just not strong enough.

“I can't do it,” I whisper faintly as, not feeling worthy of the look of raw hope in Jane's eyes, I gaze down at my lap. “I'm sorry, I am, but I can't risk making things worse than they already are.”

“You can, and when you feel in yourself that the time is right, you will,” Jane replies, once again brushing the back of her hand against my cheek. “I'm not saying it'll be now because it's what I want or what I've tried to push you in to, but you'll do it, Will, because you'll know that you have to, that... it has to be you.”

“You didn't see him when...”

“No. I didn't. But I was there for the aftermath, and I've seen him since.”

“I don't want to make things...”

“As I suspect this could pretty much go on indefinitely without any form of conclusion being reached,” Jane once again interrupts as, having worked out it's the best way of forcing herself in to my line of sight, she crouches down in front of me, “let me to try to get through to your stubbornly logical head another way.”

“I'm not stubborn, I just don't want to...”

“You're stubborn and you're afraid,” Jane states. “I get that and, trust me, I'm not having a go at you for it. You may not have the physical injuries that Ethan has, but... Mentally? I'm sorry, Will, but having spent time with both of you, you're really not much better than he is.”

“At least Ethan has an excuse,” I mutter, dredging up the energy from God alone knows where to flash Jane a grim smile. “As for me, I'm just...”

“Ethan's excuse,” Jane declares, airily cutting me off as she holds my gaze with hers and slowly shakes her head, “is that he loves you. He loves you quite possibly more than he's ever let on to himself, let alone to you, and it's the thought of having lost you, of... being convinced that he saw you murdered before his eyes, that's both keeping him trapped and holding him back. Will... Listen to what I'm saying. Ethan loves you, and because of what they made him witness, he thinks that you're gone and that the only reason he's seeing you now is because it's what he so desperately wants. He doesn't hold you responsible or hate you, he just wants you to be real so badly that he's afraid that he's hallucinating.

“I...” Not really knowing what to say, I fall silent and stare, both wide eyed and open mouthed, at Jane as what may well be a tiny triumphant smirk begins to tug on the corners of her lips. “I just thought he... uh... thought I was a ghost or a figment of his imagination because of what he saw,” I murmur, not quite daring to believe that what Jane just said could possibly be true while, at the same time, hoping like crazy that it is. “I mean, given what he's been through, it's not surprising that his mind could still be playing tricks on him.”

“He loves you,” she repeats, standing up and ruffling my hair. “He loves you, and he's beating himself up for never having told you, and he wants you to be alive so desperately that he just can't bring himself to believe it, and, William, it's because of this that you're the only one who's ever going to be able to get through to him. Benji and I can repeat ourselves until we're blue in the face, but in the end it all comes down to you. You're what he both wants, and needs.”

“Jane, I...”

“And, while I'm at it, he's what you both want and need as well.”

“What if...”

“Tomorrow never came?”

“Jane...”

“Seize the moment. If not now and, seriously, Will, my lecture and pushy attitude aside, it doesn't have to be now at all so long as you think about it, then... when you're good and ready. It mightn't be something any of us like thinking about, but we only have one life and it's up to us to make the very most of it.” Sighing, she smiles ruefully and glances towards Ethan's door. “You don't have to tell me that the circumstances were entirely different as, believe me, I know, but I... I didn't seize the moment with Trevor and, yeah, I still regret it. I'm not saying I'm confident that we'd still be together or anything like that, but... I don't know, I still wish he'd known just how much he meant to me.”

“I'm sure he did anyway,” I reply as, some semblance of life finally settling over me, I get to my feet and, ignoring the wary, slightly defensive look Jane is giving me, wrap my arms around her for a quick hug. “Jane, I hear what you're saying and you have my word that I'll take it all on board and think about it,” I continue, tightening my arms around her as, with a small sigh, she relaxes into my embrace. “I'm not, although I wish that I could, promising anything as you know as well as I do that I'm not the only... participant... in this sad and sorry tale, but I'll do my best to not let you down.”

“It's not, and nor has it ever been, about me,” Jane replies thickly as she straightens up and gently pushes me away. “It's about you, Will, and Ethan. Me and Benji, we're just concerned observers.”

“Concerned observers that I suspect we'd both be in an even worse place without,” I counter, sneaking in a quick kiss to Jane's cheek. “Just... Thank you. I know I haven't been pulling my weight and I apologise.”

“There's nothing to apologise for as we're all in this together,” she murmurs dismissively. “Look, Will, I can't tell you how you should feel or just what it is you should do, but, please... Just think about everything I've said and, if, and only if, you're feeling up to it, go and see Ethan. He's both awake and alert, and I'm not kidding when I say I think you both need this. But...” Trailing off, she graces me with a bright grin that's as forced as it is faked and starts to walk off. “Having had my say, I'm going to join Benji for a late lunch in the bistro across the street, so... Just do whatever it is you feel comfortable with, Will, that... That's all I ask.”

Her piece, in so many ways, said, Jane grabs her coat, bag, and sunglasses from off the back of the sofa and, without another room, slips out of the suite.

Alone, I stare at the door Jane had just disappeared through for a few seconds before straightening my shoulders and, although it's still close to being just about the last thing I feel like doing, slowly making my way over to Ethan's room. Coming to a stop a short distance back from the door, I gaze down at the door handle and, despite knowing that I don't really have a choice in the matter and that it really is something I have to – man up and – do, hesitate over reaching for it. I accept that everything Jane's just said to me makes perfectly logical sense and that, if not for my sake then for his, I have to face him, but...

Dear God.

Accepting and actually... doing... are just two entirely different things. 

I want to see Ethan. Of course I do. Keeping my distance these past few days has almost been as tough on me as not knowing where he was had been. Although we've only been seperated by a thin wall, it could have been thousands of miles as far as I've been concerned and, regardless of having always possessed the ability to attempt to do something about it, I've hated it. 

I...

I just haven't been able to bring myself to do anything about it, that's all.

He's my lover and, even more importantly than that, my best friend, and...

… He thinks I'm a ghost.

Ethan's convinced that I'm dead because of the cruelly staged... 'act'... his captors had play out in front of him, and I just don't know what to do about it. I don't know how to get through to him and, again, I'm so afraid of doing the wrong thing by him that I – take the path of least resistance – do nothing. I hide from him, and I worry, and I wave a futile fist at the unfairness of it all, and I let Benji and Jane carry the entire load of his care, and...

… I do nothing.

Just as I'm still doing nothing. Not so long ago, hell, this time last week even, I took a degree of pride in always being both pragmatic and logical, Granted, I generally take longer to think things through than, say, Ethan for example, but I've always gotten there in the end. I've always reached a logical conclusion and followed through with it. Breaking things down as simply as I possibly can, I know that I have to see Ethan and that now is as good a time as any to make my move. I also know that if I put it off that I'm only delaying the inevitable and possibly even perpetuating his confused take on things.

I know all this.

I do.

I just don't know if I can do it, though.

I want to, and it makes sense to do it, but...

… What if I make things worse? Now that I'm alone in the hotel suite with him, what if I cause him to have some sort of break down without Benji and Jane being here as a form of backup? What if I simply... can't... get through to him?

My mind awash with going nowhere thoughts that seem hell bent on forever holding me captive, I sigh heavily and am in the process of taking a step back from the door when, suddenly, it's pulled open and Ethan materialises in front of me. Dressed, far more for reasons of both comfort and 'ease of access' than either personal style or actual choice, in a pair of old fashioned, navy blue pyjamas and looking, if not good then at the very least far better – not, really, that it would have taken much – than he did when I last saw him, he observes me staring back at him with what I just know has to be a startled, bunny-in-the-spotlights, expression on my face and gives a small shrug.

“Maybe it's ungrateful of me,” he murmurs, reaching out a bruised hand and curling it around the door frame as though he needs it for support, “but the recovery process has always struck me as being somewhat akin to escaping one prison only to immediately find yourself in another. You know, four boring walls, nothing to do, no... end in sight.” 

“I...” More mortified by Ethan's sudden appearance forcing my hand than I am relieved by it, I take a step back and, for the extreme want of anything else to do, shake my head.

“I wondered if I'd find you out here,” he continues conversationally as, his expression on the bland side of completely unreadable, he gazes over at me. “If the mountain will not come to Muhammad, then Muhammad must go to the mountain and all that.”

Not liking how much Ethan's presence is flustering me, I shrug helplessly and, all the time trying desperately not to over think the situation, just go with the first response that pops into my head. “Uh... Shouldn't you be in bed?” I mutter, well and truly erring on the side of – let's face it – keeping up my carefully maintained façade of avoidance.

“I'm bored,” Ethan replies, slowly shifting away from the doorway and unsteadily making his way past me. “And, in case the Muhammad thing was too cryptic for you, I wanted to see if I could find you again,” he adds, an expression of what can only be described as relief settling over his face as he gingerly lowers himself down on to the sofa. “The others say that you really are alive, that I'm not just hallucinating or existing in a dream, but I... Try as I might, I just can't believe them. I want to. Oh God, do I want to believe them. But...”

“I'm alive,” I interrupt as, some semblance of life finally creeping over me, I walk around the sofa and take a seat in the armchair I'd been sitting in earlier. “Ethan, I... I know that what you saw looked real, but I...”

“I saw you die,” he whispers in a hoarse, pained voice as, closing his eyes, he presses himself up against the arm of the sofa and shakes his head. “They... They murdered you in front of me, and... and...” His eyes flying open, he swallows hard and grimaces. “Your blood, it... it lapped at my feet and I... I couldn't do anything about it! They... They killed you, and I... I...”

“Ethan, hey... Shhh...” My earlier doubt and hesitation dissolving in the face of his obvious distress, I stand up and, after walking around the coffee-table, take a seat on the sofa barely an arm's length away from him. “Just... Come on. Look at me. I'm alive and I'm here with you, and I... I'm here for you. What you saw, it wasn't real and...”

“I saw you die,” he repeats, tears welling in his eyes as he clenches his hands around the soft cotton fabric of his pyjama pants. “Will, I... I saw you die and... and felt your blood between my toes, and although I want, would give anything, actually, to believe that you're really alive and sitting here next to me, I... What I saw, it was just too real and I can't convince myself that this is real. I want you to be alive so badly that I can't even believe you... you might be real.”

“Ethan, I'm...”

“I look at you, and because it's what I want to see, my mind... it tells me that you can't be real, that... you're either a figment of my imagination or... or that you're just wearing a mask,” Ethan whispers as, making no attempt to blink back the tears, he lowers his head and gazes down at his hands. “And... It might be crazy, hell, I might be crazy, but I just can't believe that you're anything other than either an hallucination, someone messing with what's left of my head, or that I'm actually asleep and all of this is just a dream...”

“You're not dreaming, and I... At the risk of sounding as though I can't do anything other than repeat myself, Ethan, I really am alive and sitting on this sofa with you,” I murmur, blinking back my own tears. “I... I just don't know what I can do to prove it to you.”

“You can't,” Ethan replies with a heavy sigh as he slumps back against the sofa. “You can't do anything because, maybe, I don't know, maybe my mind really has gone this time and this is just going to be how it is. I see you, and I think I'm having this conversation with you, solely because it... it's what I want. Unable to cope with the thought of having to go on without you, I... I'll just keep you with me anyway that I can.”

“I...” Reluctantly accepting, as pretty much has been my fear all along, that this line of conversation could go on for ever if we let it, I wipe the back of my hand across my eyes and decide to change tack a little. “You know, you're taking my presence a lot better than you did the last time you saw me,” I state, sitting up straighter and, as Ethan half turns his head to glance at me, flashing him an encouraging smile.

“Last time I saw you I was convinced you were either a ghost or just someone sent to fuck with me even further,” he responds in a flat, possibly resigned tone. “Now though, I just don't care. If I've lost my marbles and you really are nothing more than an hallucination then... So be it. I'd rather be mad and have you with me than I would having to face up to the fact that I'll never see you again.” Pausing, he blinks tear bright eyes at me and shrugs. “Will, I know I never said it, and that it doesn't mean anything now as you're dead and I should be in a padded cell somewhere, but, I... I love...”

“You don't belong in a padded cell, and I don't want to hear it, not... Not like this,” I interrupt, the agitation, the sheer fucking... helplessness... I'm feeling at having to see Ethan like this coming through loud and clear in my voice. Everything, from my futile regret at not having been the one to rescue him to the way I've been avoiding him for fear of placing myself in a situation I didn't want to be in because I knew I wouldn't be able to control it, else aside, this man means the world to me and I hate feeling as though I'm incapable of doing a single thing for him.

But...

Enough is enough, though.

Whatever it takes.

Be it repeating myself like an autistic parrot or just going with some out-of-the-box idea that comes out of nowhere, I'm not going to back down until I have him back with me.

I...

I can't.

I can't continue to hide from him any more than I can, now that we've started down this path, back down and once again retreat with my tail between my legs.

So...

Again. 

Whatever it takes.

“Ethan... We'll get through this,” I declare, reaching out my hand and wafting it over his knee. “You and I, somehow we'll get through all of this and you'll see that you're not mad, that I'm still here and... Things... You'll see. They'll be okay.”

“Or, alternatively, so long as I don't wake up and face reality they'll be okay,” Ethan mutters, giving me a sad, wistful look. “I know, and you've got to take my word for this, that I'm acting like a complete whack job, but I just can't accept that you're real. You... You look like I want you to look, you sound like I want you to sound, and you're even acting like I want you to act, but...” His voice catching in his throat, he gazes down in the general vicinity of my hand and shakes his head. “You're dead. I saw you die.”

“You didn't see me die,” I reply, dropping my hand down onto my lap. “What you saw was some poor bastard wearing a mask of face, and... you saw what Witter wanted you to see. Not having been able to find the body, we don't even know who he was and can only assume that Witter chose him because he was so similar to my size, but... Listen to me, Ethan, he wasn't me and there's got be something I can do to get this through to you. Yes, he looked like me, and, yes, I can fully understand your... doubt and apprehension, but you've got to believe that the man you saw murdered wasn't me, that I'm still here and that, even more to the point, I'm not going anywhere.”

“You can't control my dreams,” he murmurs in a voice barely above that of a whisper as he directs his heartbreakingly simple comment to his knees. “If I'm dreaming, then...”

“If you're dreaming then, you're right, there's nothing I can do to get through to you,” I finish, “but as you're not dreaming and we really are having this stuck in a rut conversation, I have to be able to do something to prove to you that I am who I say I am.”

“Nothing. There's... nothing,” Ethan mumbles as, still keeping his head lowered, he lifts his hands and rubs them over his tired and bruised face. “I... I'm broken, Will, and you can't...”

“Okay. Fine,” I interrupt, once again changing tack in the hope of – pretending Ethan didn't just say that he was broken – moving things along. “Let's, for a minute, just work on the belief that this is real and you're not dreaming, yeah?”

“But...”

“Uh! No buts. You're not dreaming, I really am clutching at straws here, and, come on, unless you've got a better suggestion, how about just humouring me for a minute or two...”

“As I already said, I'd rather be here in la-la land with you than on my own, so... Fine. Whatever. Remind me again just why it is you've always been the logical one.”

“The logical... Uh. Fine.” Shifting an inch or two closer to Ethan, I wait until he's lowered his hands and is more or less looking in my direction before adding, “You think I'm wearing a mask...”

“I...” He nods. “I think, for this to be... uh... real, that you have to be someone wearing a mask.”

“To mess with your head?”

“Something like that.”

“Well, I'm not just some guy wearing a mask, I'm Will, your... Will, and...” I lean forward and place my hand lightly on my cheek. “Perhaps if you'd like to touch my face you could...”

“The technology is so good now that a good mask even feels like skin,” Ethan interrupts, giving me a disappointed look. “I could touch you and, like everything else, your skin would feel like I want it to feel.”

Annoyed at myself for having forgotten just how life-like the masks are these days, all I can do is nod my agreement before, nothing ventured, nothing gained and all that, trying again. “You're right,” I mutter, cocking my head to the side and exposing the side of my neck. “How about this, though...” Sliding my hand down the side of my face, I start to scratch at the soft skin behind my ear in the hope of him being able to see that the only thing my fingers are digging in to is flesh, not latex. “Look. Nothing's lifting. If I was wearing a...”

“Stop. Please,” Ethan interjects in a quiet, almost pleading voice that, never having heard it before, immediately causes the hair on the back of my neck to stand up on end. “I... I don't want to see you hurt yourself,” he continues, reaching out his hand and closing it around my wrist. “Even if you're not Will, I... I've seen enough of his blood to last me a life time, and I...”

“Hey... Shhh... I'm not going to hurt myself,” I reply as, yet again mentally berating myself for having somehow found a way to do what appears to be obviously the... wrong thing, I let Ethan pull my hand away from my jaw. “I was just... Uh... You know what, never mind. The mask angle clearly not working, how about...”

“Just shooting me and putting me out of my misery?” he offers wryly as he lets go of my wrist and lets his hand fall down on to his lap. “I... Damn it! Don't think I don't know that I'm acting like some sort of award winning nut-job as, trust me, I know. I know that I'm acting irrationally and that I need to get a Goddamn grip, but...”

“It's hard?” I suggest quietly. “It's okay, Ethan. You've been through...”

“It's not okay,” he mutters with an adamant shake of his head as he shoots me a beseeching look. “It's not okay at all. In fact, it's so far from okay that I... Just... Get this. Sometimes I look at Jane and Benji and wonder if they're as much a figment of my imagination as you are.”

“Ethan...”

“No. Wait. It gets better. Sometimes I even contemplate just getting dressed and sneaking off again. I tell myself that it would be better, that... I'd be free of my hallucinations, but...” Tears once again welling in his eyes, he gives another shake of his head and gazes over at the coffee-table. “I can't... I can't do it. I can't bring myself to leave because... even if none of you are real, I'd still prefer to be here with you, and... There... There's just no help for it. I've just lost it.”

“Misplaced it, maybe, but definitely not lost it,” I reply as, knowing full well questioning my determination to keep Ethan here in the hotel suite with us as opposed to being safely locked away in the infirmary with doctors and psychiatrists on tap to look after him isn't going to achieve a single, solitary thing, I accept that, having now got this far, I just have to do what I can to keep pushing ahead. I'm not saying, in fact I'm far from convinced of it, that I have it in me to get Ethan through this, but what I do know is that I've got to try. 

Make that, I've got to both try and never, ever give up.

“I wish I had your optimism,” Ethan murmurs despondently. “I think I'm sitting here with either a ghost, an hallucination, or some stranger in a mask, while you...”

“Uh! On that...” An idea, perhaps not a very good one, granted, but an idea nevertheless, popping into my head in response to Ethan mentioning the mask angle again, I lean forward and, without pausing to fall prey to the doubt I can already feel creeping in, murmur, “Would you be willing to go back there with me? That is, if I could take you back mentally to when you thought you saw me being murdered, would you be okay with giving it a go? The final say on the matter is yours, Ethan, and if you don't feel up...”

“If you think you can do it, then... just do it,” he interjects, glancing over at me with an openly curious expression. “Not knowing how much longer I'll be able to cope existing in this... void... I'm open to try anything you might want to throw at me. So... Do it. If you think you've got an idea that might work, just do it.”

“Are you sure? It might be too soon to take...”

“I survived, if you can call this living, it once, so I can survive it again.”

“Okay.” Dear God. Here goes nothing. “Before we go back there, I have to ask you something.”

“Anything,” Ethan replies agreeably as, making himself a little more comfortable against the corner of the sofa, he gives me his undivided attention. “If you think you're on to something then I just want you to follow it through to wherever it might take us.”

“Okay,” I repeat, locking my eyes on Ethan's and, feeling as though just doing it mentally isn't going to cut it this time, going so far as to physically cross my fingers. “You know what I look like naked, yes?”

His eyes widening in obvious surprise at the... randomness... of my question, Ethan stares back at me for a couple of seconds before nodding. “Uh... Yes. I know what you look like naked.”

“In particular, my chest and torso. Do you think you'll be able to get a clear picture in your mind of what I look like without a top on?”

“I know what your naked chest looks like,” Ethan replies as the briefest hint of a smile flashes across his lips. “I also know how oddly... ticklish... it is, and how you seem to have quite a thing for having your back washed.”

“Mmm... My penchant for never missing an opportunity to share a shower with you, you mean,” I reply, giving him a smile of my own as, for an all too brief moment, I see a glimpse of the real Ethan, my Ethan, in the increasingly tired looking man sitting on the sofa with me. If he can so readily confirm that he remembers what I look like naked, hell, if the memory is enough to bring a smile to his face, then there's no denying that he's still in there somewhere and that I can't give up.

“You know, in the early days I did kind of wonder about your unerring ability to put in an appearance just after I'd turned the shower on,” he murmurs, his smile slipping. “Then... Then I started to take it for granted and now, now that you've mentioned it, I... I miss it. I... I miss... you...”

“You only have to say the word and I'll happily shower with you,” I respond lightly as, wanting to keep things moving, I deliberately gloss over both the sadness in Ethan's statement and just how much I'd like for it to become an instant reality. I know his body is bruised, scarred and tender, but if we could be in the shower together it would mean that he'd accepted that I was real, and...

… I can't even put into words just how much that would mean to me.

“But... First things first,” I continue a little breathlessly as, struggling to keep my smile in place, I endeavour to pick up where I left off. “You're confident that you know my naked torso, yes?”

“Intimately,” Ethan confirms. “But... Where are going with this? I don't...”

“You'll see,” I interrupt. “That is... Uh... Hopefully... you'll see. But... Moving on. Oh! And, please, if at any point this gets too much for you, just tell me. As my idea is vague at best, I want you to know that you're always in charge, that if things become uncomfortable for you...”

“Become?” he mutters, pulling a face. “Things... are... uncomfortable for me, so, please, as you've definitely made me curious, just... do what you've decided you have to do.”

“Are you...” Stopping myself from just issuing forth with the obvious, I lean slightly forward and nod. “Okay. I want you to describe the man's torso to me,” I declare, watching Ethan's face as he frowns at the, no doubt to him, odd direction I seem intent on going in. “The man you saw murdered in front of you in the warehouse, I want you to describe what his torso looked like to me. Just... Ignore his head and everything else about him, and focus solely on his naked chest.”

“His chest?” Ethan echoes dubiously as, his frown intensifying, he gives a small shake of his head. “Why? I've already told you that I know what your chest looks like, so...”

“Humour me,” I murmur with a gentle smile of encouragement. “I'll admit I'm, for me, anyway, going a little outside of the box here, but... Please. Just humour me and describe his torso to me.”

Although he looks far from convinced that this actually stands any chance of going anywhere, Ethan nevertheless shrugs his approval and, in a bemused sounding voice, states, “Caucasian, medium height and build, defined, but certainly not overly so, he... He just looked like you.”

“Did he, though, did he really?” I prompt. “Think about it, Ethan. Focus in on the smaller details. Did he have any scars, or particularly noticeable moles or freckles? I don't know, perhaps you noticed a rash of some sort or...”

“Actually...” His frown of confusion subtly changing to one of concentration, Ethan looks me in the eye and nods. “Come to think of it, he... did... have a rash of some description.” Pausing, he lifts his hand and slowly gestures towards the middle of his chest. “Here,” he adds. “Between his nipples there seemed to be a pale, so pale that I didn't even notice it at first, rash, but...”

“What do you think might have caused it?” I query, taking my success at having snared Ethan's attention and just running with it. “An allergy to something? Could it have been an injury of...”

“It... You know, this is probably going to sound stupid, but now that I'm thinking about it, it... it almost looked like the sort of rash you might get from... shaving...”

“Shaving, huh?”

“It sounds stupid, I know, but... Yeah. It looked like it could have been a shaving rash.”

“Like... He may have recently had his chest shaved, perhaps?”

“Perhaps, but...”

“Okay. So he had a rash between his nipples that may or may not have been caused by shaving,” I interject as, for the first time in what feels like far too long, I start to imagine a dim glow of light starting to shine at the end of the tunnel. Not only have I successfully planted the seed of doubt in Ethan's head but, at the risk of getting ahead of myself here, I also like to think I have it in me to see my idea through to the end. Ethan, although he's clearly tiring, is fully engaged with what's going on and, best of all, I honestly believe I've already managed to get him to see things in a different light. “Now... Was there anything else? Did you see any scars?”

“Not on his chest, per se,” Ethan replies without a moment's hesitation, “but on the left side of his stomach, above the hip, there was actually a faded scar. The sort, now that you've got me thinking about it, that's usually as a result of having had your appendix out.”

“An appendix scar, yeah?”

“It could have been, yeah,” he confirms as, a gleam of hope appearing in his eyes, he looks at me expectantly and clearly waits for me to go on.

“Okay. So... Moving on. The man you saw murdered had what may or may not have been a shaving rash on his chest, and an appendix scar. Now... Looping back to where we started, what about my chest? I know I've got my own fair share of scars, but...”

“You don't have an appendix scar,” Ethan finishes, the words falling out of his mouth in a rush as, or so I hope anyway, the penny finally drops into place and he realises just what the hell it is I've been getting at here. “To the best of my knowledge you still have your appendix, and...”

“Going anywhere near my chest with a razor would be a severe case of overkill,” I murmur, making no attempt to disguise my relief at having seemingly – so far, so good at any rate – achieved what I set out to. “It's okay, you don't have to say it as I know I'm not exactly what you'd call... hirsute and have never shaved my chest in my life. I do, however, have some scars which I'm sure, if you think about it, you'll be able to clearly remember. Like...”

“The one on your left shoulder,” Ethan states, cutting me off in his eagerness to get through this. “You have a scar on your left shoulder from where you were shot in Prague, a knife wound just below your naval on your right side from that lunatic in New York, and... Oh! Then there's that one on your left side that you got as a result of that explosion in Hong Kong, and...”

“And I think I'm going to have to stop you there before I end up feeling like Frankenstein's monster, all scarred and stitched together,” I mutter with a dry laugh as, standing up, I position myself directly in front of Ethan and reach for the top button of my shirt. “Now... Just to make sure we're one hundred percent on the same page here, your memories of my body versus that of the man in the warehouse, they're yours and yours alone, right? I haven't put words into your mouth or guided you in any way, and... You're with me, aren't you, Ethan? You know what's coming...”

“I've got a fairly good idea of what's coming,” he replies, both slowly and with obvious effort pushing himself into a more upright position. “In fact, as you really have made your point, you don't even have to...”

“Maybe not, but wanting to snuff the doubt out once and for all, I'm going to anyway,” I respond as, all the time keeping my gaze locked on Ethan, I quickly undo the buttons on my shirt and let it fall open to expose my bare chest. “Just... Look at me, Ethan. Keep in mind everything you've just said about scars and rashes and the like, and look at me. Witter might have thought that he knew me well enough to convince you that some man in a mask of my face really was me, but he didn't. He didn't know me as well as you do and, come on, Ethan, you've got to believe that I'm alive, that I really am here with you, and... that you've got to come back to me...” My cards, such as they were, having been well and truly played, I fall silent and, as Ethan reaches out a hesitant hand to brush across the scar on my waist, lean forward into his touch. “If... If this doesn't work, I... I don't...”

“While I'm not yet convinced that this isn't just a dream,” Ethan murmurs, resting his hand flat against my waist as, reaching up with his other hand, he strokes his fingers lightly across the scar on my shoulder, “what I can believe is that... You really are... you. You're alive, the man I saw murdered wasn't you at all, and I... Oh God, Will...” The emotion of the moment getting too much for Ethan in his fragile state, he drops his hands onto my hips and rests his head against my waist. “I've been such an idiot. I let Witter into my head and, instead of fighting him off, I let him take root. I... I've been so caught up in my grief at thinking you were dead that I... I lost my grip on reality. Even now... Even now that you've successfully torn through Witter's charade, I'm afraid that it's only a dream, that when I wake up nothing will have changed and I'll still be convinced that you're dead.”

“Then we'll keep going through this until you accept for a fact that it's real,” I reply, gently placing my hands on Ethan's shoulders as I lean forward and kiss the top of his head. “Whatever it takes, Ethan. I'll play Groundhog Day with you for however long it takes as I... I'm not going anywhere. I'll repeat myself, and I'll do whatever I can for you, and I won't ever give up, and I... I'll fight for you. I'll fight for you because I love you, and because I want you back with me.”

“I just...” Sighing, Ethan slumps back against the sofa and gives me a weary, miserable look. “I'm just so afraid that I'll wake up and be right back where I started again,” he whispers. “Yes... Right now I believe you're alive and... it's incredible, it really is, but... I don't know. What if I wake up and, even if all of this is still fresh in my mind, I don't believe it and just put it down to being a dream? Will, I... I can't do that to you. I can't keep imposing on you when... when I'm just useless!

“You're not useless and, again, I really am prepared to do whatever it takes.” Not wanting to feel as though I'm looming over him, I choke back a sigh and sit back down on the sofa. “Ethan... Just... Where else am I going to go, huh? I won't lose you because of what that asshole Witter did to you and, again, I'm not going anywhere. Like you said earlier about staying simply because, even if none of it was real, you'd still rather be here with us than on your own, I'd still prefer to repeat myself every day in the hope of getting through to you than I would having to face each day without you.” Pausing, I smile grimly and hold my hand out towards Ethan in the hope he'll take it. “Face it. You're stuck with me.”

“Face it? I'm counting on it,” he murmurs, glancing at my hand but making no move to take it. “It's just... I'm sorry, Will. I know I'm not making any sense, and that God knows you're being very patient with me, but this... fear... of none of this being real, I just can't shake it.

“Then...” Realising that this really has taken a lot out of Ethan and that not only is he looking exhausted but also incredibly close to sleep, I drop my hand on to my lap and quickly search my mind for a logical way to provide him the proof he so desperately requires. Deciding, given my reasonable success with highlighting the differences between my chest and that of the dead man's, that offering him something tangible is clearly the way to go, I glance at the coffee-table and, spotting a notepad and a pen just lying there, settle on pinning my hopes on the written word.

“How about this, then,” I continue, snatching up the pad and pen. “How about I write something down that I then give to you for safe keeping? When you wake up, you can tell me what it says before unfolding the paper and reading it, and, that way, you'll have your proof...”

“Well... It's certainly worth a try, I suppose,” Ethan replies as, looking more and more tired by the second, he visibly droops before my eyes. “I mean, I'll take anything you can offer me at the moment...”

“Then let's give this a go,” I respond, flicking over the cover of the notepad and, on the first blank page, quickly writing done something that, given our history together, I can't help but think is rather apt. I then tear the page out and, after returning the pen and pad to the coffee-table, hand it over to Ethan. “Here. You keep a hold of this and, when you wake up, you'll see that all of this really is real.”

Taking the paper from me, Ethan glances down at what I've written and, just as I'd hoped it would, what he sees makes him smile. “Where else am I going to go,” he murmurs, carefully folding the paper into a small square that he then closes the fingers of his right hand around for safe keeping. “I like it...”

“Well, I thought it was pretty fitting,” I reply, making myself comfortable against the arm of the sofa before holding my arm out towards Ethan and gesturing for him to join me. “Come on, you. As I don't think you have a snowflake's chance in hell of making it back to your bed at the moment, why don't you come and have a nap against me... That way I'll still be with you when you wake up and find the note in your hand.”

Nodding, Ethan shifts closer and, after stretching his legs out along the sofa, rests his back against my side and lowers his head onto my chest. “I like the way you think,” he mumbles through a yawn as I place my arm around his waist and gently pull him closer. “In fact, I... I like everything about you...”

“And I like everything about you, too,” I whisper, planting another kiss on the top of his head. “Now... Shhh... Go to sleep and, when you wake up, you'll find that I'm still here, that I... That I'm not going anywhere...”

~*~*~*~

I wake, at first disorientated and groggy, in the exact same position against the arm of the sofa, and with Ethan, his breathing steady and reassuring, draped warmly against me, that I fell asleep in. Surprised, as much by the fact that I slept at all as I am by the room being bathed not in daylight but by a soft light coming from the two lamps on either side of the television set in front of me, I gingerly lift my arm from around Ethan's shoulders and read on my watch that it's actually just gone half past ten and realise that, assuming Jane left to join Benji for a late lunch around two, I've most likely been asleep for close to eight hours. Sleep, bar the odd catnap here and there and never for more than an hour at a time, having eluded me ever since I first learned of Ethan's disappearance, to have slept for this long is nothing short of amazing and I can't deny that I certainly feel better for it.

Refreshed, comfortable, and perhaps even most importantly at all, hopeful.

Ethan's still here, curled around me and sound asleep, and I can see, just peeping out of his tightly clenched hand, the note I wrote for him eight or however many hours ago. And this, of course, means, should I have felt any compulsion to travel down this particular route myself, that is, that it wasn't a dream at all and that, to my great relief, it all really did happen. I really did get it through to Ethan that I'm alive and, while it remains to be seen as to whether it'll actually work or not, I really did give him something – in this case literally – to hold on to.

Smiling to myself, I carefully lower my arm back around his shoulders and curl my fingers lightly around his upper arm. Although he looks, even in the dim light, like death warmed up and I can't help but be particularly dismayed at how long it seems to be taking for the wound caused by the rope around his neck to be healing, he's still a sight for sore eyes and, regardless of what takes place when he wakes up, I'm just so relieved to have him with me that I doubt I could successfully put into words how much he means to me if I tried.

Ethan, he...

He really is my everything. My reason for getting up in the morning, my reason for doing just about everything that I do, and definitely the reason I can't think of any other position that I'd rather be in than the one I'm in right now. And, seriously, if he wakes up and immediately reverts to declaring that I have to be a ghost then, without hesitation, I'll start all over again. And, while I'm at it, I'll do it over and over again until he believes me. I hope, of course I do, that it won't come to that, but if it does then... What will be will be. I'll repeat myself, and both love him and wait for him, and I won't give up. 

And, again, having done it once already, I won't hesitate or put my own fears first. I'll man up, and I'll fight. I'll fight for the man I love and that, simply, is all there is to it.

A sense of peace settling over me at my very own declaration of intent, I glance down at Ethan and notice for the first time that he now has a soft blanket draped over his waist and legs. Knowing that this could have only come from one source, my smile broadens and instead of feeling a sense of annoyance at having been so deeply – out of it – asleep that I missed their careful ministrations, I'm actually touched by it as it shows a sense of both trust and familiarity that I know we're lucky to take for granted. Having returned from their lunch, Jane and Benji would have found us both asleep on the sofa and immediately set about doing whatever they could to ensure our comfort. This is clear not only in the blanket over Ethan's legs, but also in the bottles of water, plates of sandwiches and cookies covered in cling film, and small array of pill bottles that – I just know Ethan's going to be in need of not long after he wakes up – have been spread out on the coffee-table for us. In fact, I think it's fairly safe to say that they've pretty much thought of everything to help get us going again.

The accumulated horrors of the past fortnight finally dissolving around me and leaving me feeling lighter and more content that I've perhaps felt for ages, I hug Ethan just that little bit closer to me and watch as, opening his eyes, he slowly blinks me into focus.

“Will?” he murmurs, making no attempt to sit up or push away from me. “Is that...” Trailing off, he looks down at the piece of paper in his hand and, without unfolding it, adds in a whisper, “Where else am I going to go...”

Nodding, I take the paper from his hand and unfold it so that he can read what's written on it. “Where else am I going to go, indeed,” I reply as, clearly seeing what he'd hoped to see, Ethan's face breaks into a radiant, heart felt expression of relief that I'm only too happy to return in kind. “Face it, Ethan,” I add quietly as he takes the paper back from me and folds his fingers around it, “you're stuck with me.”

“Face it?” he responds, sitting up just far enough to be able to plant a soft kiss on my cheek. “Will, I... I'm counting on it. I mean, you've got me this far, and... as I now believe this to be real, you really... have... got me this far, so... uh... I think it's only fair to say you're stuck with me as well.”

“Then...” Using my free hand to gently cup the side of his face, I lean forward and tenderly kiss him directly on the lips. “It's a good job I'm not going anywhere, isn't it...”

~ end ~


End file.
